3 months ago

Date: 15 May 1993 - Host Venue: Green Glens Arena, Millstreet, Ireland
Presenter: Fionnuala Sweeney - Musical director: Noel Kelehan
Directed by Anita Notaro - Executive supervisor Christian Clausen
Executive producer Liam Miller
Host broadcaster: Raidió Teilifís Éireann (RTÉ)
Opening act: The story of Eochaid and Étaín in Celtic mythology, transitioning into a video of rural Ireland today.
Interval act: "Why Me?", performed by Linda Martin
and "Voices (Are Calling)", performed by Johnny Logan with the Children of Millstreet and the Cork School of Music Choirs

The Eurovision Song Contest 1993 was the 38th edition of the Eurovision Song Contest and was held on 15 May 1993 at Green Glens Arena in Millstreet, County Cork, Ireland. The presenter was Fionnuala Sweeney. Niamh Kavanagh was the winner of this Eurovision for Ireland with the song, "In Your Eyes". This was Ireland's fifth victory, and equalled the tally of five Eurovision victories achieved by France in 1977 and Luxembourg in 1983. Ireland became the fourth country to win two years in a row, the three previous countries to do so were Spain in 1968 and 1969, Luxembourg in 1972 and 1973, and Israel in 1978 and 1979.

The top two countries of this contest were the same as the top two countries in the previous year's contest, being Ireland and the United Kingdom.

The location for this year's edition of the contest was unique, in that Millstreet, with a population at the time of just 1,500 people, was the smallest host town ever chosen for the Eurovision Song Contest.

The owner of the Green Glens Arena, Noel C. Duggan, wrote to the RTÉ on the same night of the Irish victory in the 1992 edition, proposing the free use of the venue to host the contest. The venue, a large indoor and well- equipped equestrian centre that could accommodate a 3500 seated audience was deemed more than suitable as the location by host broadcaster RTÉ. With huge support from local and national authorities, plus several businesses in the region, the town's infrastructure was greatly enhanced in order to accommodate an event of this scale. Killarney, a larger town located 30 kilometres from Millstreet was chosen as a second host town, accommodating the majority of the contestants and delegates. It was also the largest outside broadcast ever attempted by state broadcaster RTÉ and was deemed a technical and logistical success for all involved.

The stage was created by Alan Farquharson, who was also chief production designer two years later in Dublin. The design resembled a scalene triangular shaped performance area, under lit by multicoloured cable lighting and featured a hydraulically controlled walkway, with a mirrored ceiling structure suspended above the stage that mirrored the floor shape and reflected lighting.

For the first time, a pre-qualifying round was introduced, but only for countries that had either never participated in the contest at all, or in the case of former republics of Yugoslavia, had not previously competed as nations in their own right.

Results
Draw Country Artist Song Language Place Points
01 Italy Enrico Ruggeri "Sole d'Europa" Italian 12 45
02 Turkey Burak Aydos "Esmer Yarim" Turkish 21 10
03 Germany Münchener Freiheit "Viel zu weit" German 18 18
04 Switzerland Annie Cotton "Moi, tout simplement" French 3 148
05 Denmark Tommy Seebach Band "Under stjernerne på himlen" Danish 22 9
06 Greece Katerina Garbi "Ellada, hora tou fotos"Greek 9 64
07 Belgium Barbara Dex "Iemand als jij" Dutch 25 3
08 Malta William Mangion "This Time" English 8 69
09 Iceland Inga "Þá veistu svarið" Icelandic 13 42
10 Austria Tony Wegas "Maria Magdalena" German 14 32
11 Portugal Anabela "A cidade (até ser dia)" Portuguese 10 60
12 France Patrick Fiori "Mama Corsica" French, Corsican 4 121
13 Sweden Arvingarna "Eloise" Swedish 7 89
14 Ireland Niamh Kavanagh "In Your Eyes" English 1 187
15 Luxembourg Modern Times "Donne-moi une chance" French, Luxembourgish 20 11
16 Slovenia 1X Band "Tih deževen dan" Slovene 22 9
17 Finland Katri Helena "Tule luo" Finnish 17 20
18 Bosnia and Herzegovina Fazla "Sva bol svijeta" Bosnian 16 27
19 United Kingdom Sonia "Better the Devil You Know" English 2 164
20 Netherlands Ruth Jacott "Vrede" Dutch 6 92
21 Croatia Put "Don't Ever Cry" Croatian, English 15 31
22 Spain Eva Santamaría "Hombres" Spanish 11 58
23 Cyprus Zimboulakis & Van Beke "Mi stamatas" (Μη σταματάς) Greek 19 17
24 Israel Lahakat Shiru "Shiru" (שירו) Hebrew, English 24 4
25 Norway Silje Vige "Alle mine tankar" Norwegian 5 120